Russia’s next president is a vinyl collector and Led Zeppelin fanatic
This is quite remarkable!
Dmitry Medvedev: The man who would be president
news.cbc.ca 12/17/2007
Deputy Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev looks on during a meeting with doctors in Rome, June 19, 2007. (Associated Press)
He is a 42-year-old law professor with a passion for Led Zeppelin music who has never held elected office.
But if the stars align right — and it is hard to see how they won’t — Dmitry Medvedev is very likely to be Russia’s next president after the ballots are counted in March of 2008.
Officially nominated on Dec. 17, he has the support of Russia’s ruling party United Russia as well as three smaller pro-Kremlin parties — A Just Russia, Agrarian Party of Russia and Civil Force Party. More importantly, he has the backing of the outgoing and still wildly popular President Vladimir Putin, who is likely to become prime minister, once his two terms as president are over.
If he is successful in his bid, Medvedev will be the country’s youngest president ever elected, which raises a question.
Who is Dmitry Medvedev?
Born in St. Petersburg, then known as Leningrad, in 1965, Medvedev is the son of two university professors. He was a top student who went on to receive a law degree from St. Petersburg University in 1987 and then completed a PhD in law in 1990.
Shortly after graduating, he married his school sweetheart Svetlana and they have a 12-year-old son, Ilya.
He is a devoted fan of hard rock and cites Black Sabbath, Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin among his favourites. These bands would have been on the state-issued blacklists during Medvedev’s Soviet-era schooldays, but he has said he had taped copies, perhaps from bootleggers. Today, he collects the bands’ original vinyls and said in an interview with Russian magazine Itogi that he had amassed all of Deep Purple’s recordings.
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